Underdawg3ate1

As they say in these parts, Only In Pennsylvania! This happened in the Berkshire Mall in Reading, I've been there plenty of times and like every other mall in america.....it is heavily populated by mindless zombies who wonder aimlessly while fixated with those little hand held gadgets! Everyone can bet their sweet ass that she's gonna sue.....and she's gonna win....BIG TIME! That's just what they do here in Pa. The way I heard it was that she was told by her son that her lil "accident" was on the internet. Something tells me she told her family about the "accident" after showing up at the house completly drenched. Now by looking at the video, how many people would have known that the zombie in the video was her? Me thinks her family threw her under the short bus by telling all their friends and so on..... ....... .........only in Pennsylvania.....keep on scratching!!

Sorry Ruff, didn't catch the additionals there. That being said.....ambulance is ready to go eh? Good, no stay and play here! I'd tell my driver to not kill us...a saying comes to mind....don't drive faster then your gardian angel can fly......yea.....well....your gardian angel is a raped ape....try to keep up with him!! Medevac is to far away assuming it takes 50 minutes to get to the scene and then maybe 20 to the hospital, ALS support 2 hours away won't do either so it's John Wayne time. Warm up the AED and BVM, ( I'd think it would be a good idea to apply the pads just in case) scratch the 2 lpm for 15 lpm. I'd put the pt in a trendelinburg position and tell my newb once he's finished getting a set of vitals.....to do another one and so on and so on. obtain temprature, and just monitor and reassess pt for further changes. I would ask for any kind of guidance and would update them if there were any changes. Med Command would be notified of what we have, This doesn't seem like a panic attack to me, something is definately whacked out with her heart. (I don't see too many SVT calls)....white cloud here.

How is the pt mental status like? Is she excited, aggitated, combative against her family, or is she going all out ape cuss? (combative or ape cuss gets PD dispatched for me.) If excited or agitated I cautiously approch her and if she's seated I'd take a knee or sit next to her. First I'd introduce myself and my partner(s). Ask her what is going on today and what brought us out here. Of course in a calm and friendly tone. While I have my newbs check vitals, I'd assess her respiratory rate, ask if she's having pain anywhere. Check for Carpal Pedal Spasms, skin color, level of alertness, obtian pmh, meds, allergies, and any recent changes in her medication. If she's hyperventalating, I'd try to coach her on slowing down her breathing. Ask what hospital she would like to go to, if she doesn't want to go I'd try my damndest to get her to go since this is the worst attack she's had. If she agrees, I'd have my newbs package her up and get her into the ambulance while I'd talk to the family. I'd ask the spouse if she was under any extraordinary stress lately, recent deaths, life changing events, drug /booze abuse (came off of a high/relapse) and when the last event was. I'd also try to gather any remianing demographics just in case she becomes uncooperative while en route to the hospital. Drive cold to the hospital. While en route, I'd keep the pt as calm/at ease and comfortable as possible. I'd ask her the same questions I asked her spouse to see if I get any different answers. I'd also have her on 2 lpm of o2 via a NRBM until her breathing is down to normal range. Monitor vitals and engage her in conversations. I'd monitor her pain if she had complaints of pain (if she described any cardiac type pain with or without cardiac history we'd be going hot to the hospital-not wasting time for a medevac or ALS). Contact the hospital with what I get and do an ongoing assessment until we arrive.

Awesome! I wax the inside just for dawg and pony shows, to bring out some shine and reflection. It does help cleaning up a bit better. One thing though is to not wax anything that isn't smooth as it'll stain and is a PIA to get get out. Yeah I thought this subject would be good, I havn't seen anything like it already so I decided to start a thread on it. I'd LOVE it be back down in Texas agian! I was stationed at Ft Hood for 3 years and spent plenty of time down in Austin. Absolutely loved it! I was going to stay down there after my enlistment and get into meterology but I met my wife and she drug me back up into the cold! I'm pretty confident that if we didn't meet, I'd be living somewhere around Austin right. Yeah I hate...hate,,,,HATE the cold!

Some excellent replies! I'm glad I'm not the only "neat freak" out there when it boils down to how our rigs look! We handle around 950 calls (more this year), we have dry spells where we will only run one or two calls in a week or two so I like detailing the rigs to pass some time as it does get pretty boring around here at times! Twice a year I do a full detail inside and out. I go over EVERYTHING except for the engine bay and undercarrage. Wash, dry, clay, polish, wax x2 the paint, polish and wax all the outside lighting, polish diamond plating, wheels, chrome trim, and dress up any rubber, tires, and plastic moldings. Inside besides routine deconing, sweep/mop the floor, vacume the cab, clean and dress all vinyl pieces (dash, doors, center console), polish and wax the ceiling/sides that are plastic/metal, clean out compartments and under the bench seat. All windows are cleaned inside and out. Yes I even polish up the antennas.....When I'm bored my OCD kicks in BIGTIME! Like I said before it takes about 3 12 hour days all said and done. I usually do this before open house and our Make A Wish Mothers Day Convoy and then again for the fair season and winter. It sounds like overkill but to me it's well worth it! Rigs costs anywhere from 75k to well over 250k, that's alot of money invested into them, why not keeping them looking like that much! We wash outside since we have bunker coats and a big bulletin board on boths sides of the bay. I Decon as needed, if we didn't have a messy call, I may go over the back with some disinfectant wipes, equipment used definately gets it. Rig checks are done every morning, everything accounted for and in stock, o2 topped off if needed (we fill our own bottles here), lights checked for burned out bulbs, body checked for damage, underside checked for fluid leaks, and the engine is checked at the beginning of the week. Tcripp can you PLEEEEEASE send some of that heat up this way!! It's been below freezing here for the past 2 weeks and now they're calling for a nor'easter to come up the coast on Christmas day!! Uggh is it May yet?? I really miss central Texas! You'd love me as a partner!

As of 2003, there's a new one out Hard Rock Cafe: Baghdad Opening soon Under new management. Also: Who's your Baghdaddy? (you can't get any cornier then that!) I have three shirts with witty sayings. Do I look like a @!%@*%$ people person to you? I see dumb people Can't sleep, clowns will eat me (wife really hates this one! )

Sorry to here your pt didn't make it PCP, how old was he? I'm a white cloud when it comes to getting bad calls (arrests, MVA's, fire, peds, bad traumas), I think I've ran maybe 10-12 cardiac arrests in the past 8 years and sadly none of them were saves. It is a very surreal scene to come up on, the nurse says it gets better? In my honest opinion I don't think it does. It's one thing for someone to crash in your surroundings, but when you go to a home or a business...into their surroundings it just makes it much more personal to me. I'm sure you and your partner did everything in your power to save him, some are just past the point of no return before they even hit the floor. Some times the best thing is making sure the family is taken care of when nothing else seems to work. Talk about the call with your partner or other crewmembers that are seasoned with these types of calls. If you dwell on it by yourself, you're just gonna burn yourself out and that's no good for you, your partner, and your pt's/family. I remember my first Cardiac Arrest. It was right after coming home from my deployment, got called out to Dunkin Donuts for Seizures. Upon arriving on scene the rest of the crew (4 man volly crew) went inside to initiate pt care while I prepped the ambulance. The one girl came flying out saying that, "He's not breathing and has no pulse....get the AED!!" I remember like the call was yesterday, running in with the AED, two guys behind the counter with their jaws on the ground, two younger girls in the dinning area with the deer in headlights look and hands over their mouths as they watched our crew start CPR. The people in the store stated that he had just fell over and began shaking like he was having a seizure...then nothing. I slapped on the AED and went thru the procedure, zapped once and had to deal with what he was eating. We suctioned the airway did another round of CPR, got him onto the litter and into the ambulance around the same time ALS showed up. Since I was the only driver on the call, I couldn't help with working him in the back. Needless to say we didn't get him back, saw his obits in the paper several days later and saw that he had a family, again that was surreal too just thinking that I was there for his final moments. I still remember after over 5 years, just about everything from that call. What the people in the store were wearing....their reactions and emotions, where the pt was laying, what we did as a crew. I don't recall the exact day but is was around this time of the year as he had on a christmas like sweater on. You'll learn how to deal with it better as you go thru more of these types of calls. Some will be better then others, peds and folks younger then you always takes a toll, but the best thing for me at least is to talk about it. I hope this helps ya. Sean

I know this can be a sore subject to some but I haven't seen much of it on here so I figured I'd take a crack at it. How often do you guys wash and clean your rigs, inside and out? How often does your equipment get cleaned? Does anyone go all out and wax your rigs? I'm known as the "Clean Nazi" at my company and it's true, I can't stand a dirty rig! If I come in and the rigs dirty then I wash it. The only time I won't wash them is when it's below 30F or if it's raining/snowing. I wash top to bottom, tires, rims, and the diamond plating. Door and compartment jams are cleaned out and the inside is given a thorough wipe down. Windows are cleaned and RainX is applied monthly. Wash and drying takes about an hour and a half. I wax my rigs 4 times a year, twice a year (usually beginning of Spring and Autumn) I give them a full detail to get rid of scratches and blemishes. These usually takes 2 to 3 12 hour days depending how busy we are. Diamond plating and chrome gets polished, tires and trim pieces dressed, 2 coats of wax goes onto the paint, and a bunch of my vollies saying I'm obsessed! We have two 2002 Horton Type III's and they look like we took delivery of them a few months ago! To me a clean and shiny rig conveys professionalism and attention to detail to the pt and their families. I've seen other crews eyeballing our rigs and a few asking if they are new. I know it can't be done all the time, especially with companies that have a high call volume. So how do you guys do it?

Your pretty much spot on LoneStar! In my 14 years in the Army, I've served with a few gays and lesbians, they were damn good soldiers and they would've taken a bullet for me just as fast as I would for them. They didn't flaunt themselves or their lifestyles. With everything else going on in the military these days, I'm pretty much sure that this is not going to have as big of an impact as the media is trying to hype it up to be. For most it'll be business as usual. I'm sure there will be those who will stir crap up. Homosexuals have proven to more more then competent as soldiers. There will always be those who believe that gays don't deserve to live, that blacks and other people of color belong in the cotton fields and that a woman's place is barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. As bad as it is I don't think ALL of these issues are going away for at least the next several generations. Emtpociets has demonstrated this beautifully! I have had plenty of homosexual partners who not once pushed their beliefs onto me, none blatantly checked me out and none asked me out on a date. That being said, they are a blast to run with as they see life differently in my opinion.

In your previous post, you asked who had new equipment and technology, so I answered your question. Your right though, all of it is useless unless there's competent providers to staff the rigs and make a difference in this career. My work offers a free tuition to Medic school at Reading Hospital, of course that's with a 3 year contract. I'm sure PFD has a residency requirement, there's no way in hell the wifey would agree to move to Philly!!!! HOLY SMOKES! That's a big list of companies there 4c6!

Definately not dogging out the Philly guy's and gal's, just seems that they catch a lot of heat. Isn't the busiest Medic unit in the country in Philly? Over here in Lanco, The City and 'burb units are transitioning over to the power litters, as well as LP 15's and Phillips monitors. We have toughbooks and GPS systems. I never had any problems getting any ALS backup. LCWC has CAD with mapping so getting lost is a no go these days! Philly is one of the places I'm interested in once I'm thru with Medic school.

If you've never had pt contact then I would observe the first shift to get a feel for how the crew operates. After that and your comfortable start out with taking vitals and move up to asking questions, doing SAMPLE's, OPQRST's DCAP-BTLS's, scribing for the crew chief (obtaining and writing down pt info, meds, allergies, history), ect. Again ASK QUESTIONS when in doubt! After the call, review it with the crew, what the crew chief do a PCR (Pt Care Report) and ask to practice on the rigs equipment. Zippy nailed it with public facing, something that as an EMS provider you'll be doing a lot of. Even if your not a people person, fake it, make yourself friendly or else it can AND well get back to your organization. ASK QUESTIONS! Ohh, my first EMS call was for a LOL (little old lady) who became sick after eating a tossed salad several hours earlier. She thought it may be from the cheese as it tasted different.She vomited several times and her CC was abdominal pain and nausea secondary to the vomiting. Vitals were stable throughout the call and she didn't have any other complaints. Sweet old lady and I know many would have considered it a BS call, but my crew treated her like gold. All I did was observe and help out with the litter and bags. A very positive initial impression for me. Ohh yeah in case I forgot.....when in doubt.....ASK QUESTIONS!!!! Sean

I've heard that PFD is pretty rough with their EMS system, I've heard several times that it's the worst in the country, dunno if it still is or not but yeah it's all ALS providers. I don't know much about the systems in Delco, Montco, and Bucks...but I hear a lot of the companies in Chester County pay pretty well, and that a lot are fire based. You can also check into Lancaster County, the larger companies (LEMSA, SVEMS, NWEMS, and MTEMS) handle alot of transports and 911 calls, pay isn't great especially if you're new, but they're always hiring.

You OBVIOUSLY are not in the military. There are numerous militaries around the world that are fully co-ed and I wouldn't be surprised if the showers are also. If you are sooo worried about one of your troops checking you out in the shower then maybe it is YOU with the mental illness. I would be more concerned about you in the heat of a firefight because your mind is on the gay guys trying to check you out, you would be a danger to me, my soldiers, and the mission. I speak from experience here, when I had the opportunity to take a shower, the absolute last thing in my mind was who was looking at my junk. My concerns were if I was going to take a shower again or if I'd see my family again or if one of my guys OR girls were going to fall the next mission, NOT who was gay and looking at me. It's funny you seem to think that Homosexualism is a mental illness. If so the HATE is a mental illness. Hate for people who are not bothering you in any way shape or form but yet you still hate them. WELL DUH I guess that makes you as mentally ill as gays! Well we banged out women and gays, what's next ambulances for whites only and coloreds only???????? Sean

Our classes unfortunately didn't hold clinicals. I was lucky as I was already a volunteer and did plenty of "box" time. I wasn't allowed to crew chief calls but vitals, stabilizing limbs, board and collar, and general prepping and packaging the pt for transport under supervision were fair game for me. I don't know why it's not a mandatory part of some schools as I think they would be beneficial for those becoming EMT's. Doing scenarios in a class room environment and being thrown into a chaotic scene where there are some serious injuries or someone who has coded, the difference is night and day. It would really test you as a person who can function under extreme stress and test you and what you've learned in class. So the best advice to you is get your hands dirty with skills and ask questions, no matter how dumb or stupid you may feel. After the call review it with the crew to see what was done good, what could be done better, and what should never happen again! Ask your crew what they expect from you and if you feel uncomfortable doing something, let them know. If you feel confident in your skills then I think you'll do just fine. Also don't get down if the crew chief get on your case if you mess something up, it's a learning experience and nothing personal, I'm sure we've all been in that seat before! GOOD LUCK! Sean